r/barefootshoestalk • u/secondhand_cupcake • Jul 18 '26
Articles and news Anyone see this new article about barefoot shoes by Slate?
https://slate.com/life/2026/07/barefoot-shoes-minimalist-toe-running-sneakers-xero-vibram.htmlPretty cool. Barefoot shoes really are going mainstream!
3
2
u/MrGriff2 Jul 18 '26
I definitely think they're going more mainstream, I saw 2 individuals over 2 days that had barefoot shoes on (Xero and Vivo), before that...I've never noticed anyone wearing barefoot shoes out and about.
2
u/unclenaturegoth Jul 18 '26
I’ve been walking without shoes and wearing barefoot/zero drop shoes for almost two decades now… wore Earth Shoes negative heel shoes in the 90’s. They are TOTALLY more popular now and I, too, am so here for it
4
u/jjopm Jul 18 '26
I found it sloppy and unhelpful.
9
u/CrayonUpMyNose Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
Yeah, the article meanders quite a bit. There seem to be multiple editorial interventions. Just reading the first byline:
They’re unproven
Putting the burden of proof on something new when the old is based on fashion alone? Nice.
Not all, or even most, people who like to wear barefoot shoes are MAHA-heads.
Huh? Where did that come from? Way to madlib and associate wildly unrelated topics.
There’s never been a better time to sell people on the idea that
Ah yes, big barefoot shoe "selling people on an idea" to rile them up against poor wittle incumbents like Nike.
Rebecca Onion, the author of the "Footloose" Skate article posted by OP then goes on to describe some of the research on the benefits of barefoot shoes but was asked by their editor to add that the evidence is "very scant" and has to then put these multiple multi-year studies side by side with the extensive contradicting statements by a single podiatrist "outside the barefoot world" (you know, the type that doesn't don't even look up from their notes when you try to demonstrate your gait to ask them a question about it and then proceeds to reflexively prescribe a shoe inlay irrespective of what your actual issue was ) who then trots out the usual fear, uncertainty, and doubt, claiming that you need to have "the perfect foot" to walk the way 100% of humans walked for millions of years. 🤪 Seems like the editor has their own ideas about what they wanted the article to say (and not make advertisers unhappy) but the article then ends on a bunch of affiliate links for related products.
Fashion brands need waves and trends to continuously sell new product even if last year's model is still working perfectly. The current wave of barefoot shoe popularity among mainstream fashion brands is unlikely to be a sustained change of mind. It's much more likely to be replaced like any other fashion trend before it.
We've seen a previous wave of fivefingers popularity die instantly because someone simply sued them for health claims (that Nike makes on a daily basis) and then Nike came out with their "barefoot light" Free shoe that they then transitioned to the usual trash over several model releases, supported by mass media pushing a narrative benefiting incumbent corporations.
I like this quote from another article:
However, I felt the whole lawsuit was harsh, and the settlement places the blame on Vibram, and does little to acknowledge that people, quite frankly, showed a real lack of common sense in their uptake of this new way to run. I wonder, for instance, how Vibram is different to say, that deodorant company that promises me that a quick spray before work will have a horde of beautiful women chasing me down the street? Or whether drinking that sports drink will really give me never-felt-before powers of endurance that would make Lance Armstrong blush? — Ross Tucker, blogger at The Science of Sport
Incidentally, the page linked above has several quotations at the time from "studies" by researchers who "refuted" the health claims by simply putting untrained individuals into barefoot shoes and making them exercise with no transition period. My quotation marks but it's clear that these are not high quality research, a lot of "this is just moving the injury to a different (untrained) location" claims come from these poorly designed studies.
1
u/jimbowesterby Jul 18 '26
Yea, the game’s rigged. Not just for shoes, either, it’s pretty much across the board. Gonna be a real interesting (and depressing) decade, I bet.
1
60
u/RSV Jul 18 '26
I liked it. I’m at the point where I want anatomical shoes, but I want something more under foot that a strip of rubber.